


Nuckelavee

by thousandmonkeys



Category: Fairy Cube (Manga)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-10
Updated: 2016-11-10
Packaged: 2018-08-30 04:33:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8518645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thousandmonkeys/pseuds/thousandmonkeys
Summary: In his travels, Isaiah goes in search of a certain Nuckelavee. Drabble.





	

The taste of brine pervaded everything on his person, and his eyes watered as a gust of wind blew sand into his eye, sending his clothes flapping as they were caught in the breeze. The sea–! The Nuckelavee, kelpies; all the manner of nasty creatures lived in the depths, and Isaiah never had any reason to visit it.

Something that never held still, and changed its form according to some arbitary rule, had always seemed dangerous. Fluid and unsettling.

The Holy Gun weighed heavy in his hand as he trudged towards the ocean of this land. Maybe it was repentance, but he thought he owed Ian at least that much; his brother would never have set foot into the land of the Sidhe if Isaiah hadn’t stolen his body. And here, if fairy gossip were to be believed, Ian had almost lost his life. If that had happened, wouldn’t Isaiah be in a sorry sight? A lost spirit possessing the body of his brother. Let it never be said that Tokage left debts unpaid. This– this would be his final act as Tokage, before he embraced the name Isaiah, and the offer of a new life that came with it.

Raven had tried to dissuade him; the Nuckelavee was almost a god in it’s own right, after all. One of the strongest of the Celtic fairies, and certainly one of the most vengeful.

Tokage had laughed; all the better to feed his powers.

And there it was; a shadow in the mists.

Its malovelence was a miasma that rolled off it, weighing the changeling down with every step he took. “Haven’t I tried to eat you before?” it asked, and its breath was foul. Towering over him, despite its ragged hair and bestial gaze, it was still an impressive sight. It gestured at its torso, a blackened, rotting mass. Maggot twitched within it as Isaiah watched. Wholly unnerving, indeed. “Your little friend isn’t here to burn me, now.”

That was part of the tale, too; Ainsel. The demon’s door had favoured Ian Hasumi, and Isaiah felt a twinge of jealousy despite himself. “True, true,” he sang, affecting no care in the world.

“Brave boy. Delicious boy. I’ll make you my slave yet,” it said, voice full of brine and the muddy water beyond.

“Oh, terrifying!” he said, pretending at being a rapt audience. The Nuckelavee was no threat to him, especially not to a spirit with a true name. “But–It’s a pity I’m not Ian.” He did so wish he was.

“Call yourself anything, delicious boy. I don’t name my food.”

“Such a shame,” he said, smile widening. “I’m his evil twin.” That much was true enough.

The Nuckelavee went down easily; a single bullet from the Holy Gun was enough to rip it to shreds. Weakened by the fast-dissapearing belief in fairies, and the corruption of its myth, it no longer had half the strength it used to possess. Isaiah knew that all too well; as a child, back in the Sidhe village, he’d once come into contact with it. Only the intervention of a passerby had saved him, much like how Ainsel had saved Ian. Surprisingly weak; and this was what the villagers had been so terrified of? This skinless centaur with a voice as reedy as the plants forming its mane? To the extent that they’d sacrificed children to an Eldritch god, in the hopes of creating some tamed lion?

Worthless.

Oh dear **_Lord_** did he hate the ocean. It held nothing but misery.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted at @hanebito for an RP meme.


End file.
